HAVE AN ADVENTUROUS WEEKEND

CAMPFIRE

I love sitting by the glow of a flickering campfire, snuggling and laughing with my man clan. I love the color the fire casts on our skin. We tell stories, sing silly songs and eat yummy food. I get mesmerized by the dancing flames. I love the smell. They love the hot chocolate and smores the best. I love the memories of their gooey fingers and lips and hot chocolate mustaches.

FOSSIL

One of the small, unbelievably friendly towns we stopped at.

LILY'S DIARY

What do I love about camping? Everything!Getting really dirty.
Going on long adventurous walks, playing with my brothers and seeing the amazing Eastern Oregon sights.
But my favorite thing about our trip, actually any trip, was feeling the wind in my face.

WIND FARMS

Neat, straight rows of majestic wind turbines in the landscape. What a beautiful sight to see on the way home.

DINOSAURS?

Across the street from Sheep's Rock is the Thomas Cordon Paleontology Center, where there are lots of bones and fossils on exhibit to see.
The coolest thing about this center is that they have a viewing room into the laboratory. It was amazing to watch the technician carefully removing layers of rock, all the while looking through a microscope, to reveal a fragile fossil. The boys loved looking through the center, which is very family friendly and encourages questions and using the touch tables.

CATHEDRAL ROCK

The spectacular Cathedral Rock is on Highway 19, parallel to the John Day River.

ABANDONED BARN

This abandoned barn didn't have a 'No Trespassing' sign and was beckoning me to come take a look-see.

SHOE TREE

At first glance, we thought the tree was full of birds. Nope, it's full of shoes!

BLUE BASIN

Walking through the Blue Basin, you feel like you are on a seafoam green Mars or in a Star Wars movie. I wouldn't have been surprised to see a few Jawas.

Along the trail, there are a few fossils to see. The one that impressed the boys the most was the sabertooth tiger. We had so much fun walking through this amazing wonderland.

THE PAINTED HILLS

are breathtaking! It's hard to even describe how deep the colors are and the awe you feel. You stand there amazed, talking about how they really look like painted hills and it was funny how surprised we sounded as we gawked at them. They are beyond beautiful and the colored hills pop out at you from the deserty wilderness that surrounds them.
One of the trails is a 1/4 mile boardwalk that puts you up close and personal. It was so fun to take a closer look.
On a side note, we had the craziest weather while we were there. Sun, rain sprinkles, pelting hail storm and more sun.
We were told the colors of the hills look different every time you come. We definitely will be coming here again.
The Painted Hills are a must see!

NAME CHANGE

The wee ones have requested to be called LL Sunglasses (left) and LL (right). Now you know.

GHOST TOWN

Waldron School sits off of Highway 207. We were very lucky to have arrived when we did; a man who was one of the last students at this school was there and gave us permission to go on the grounds and inside. While inside we might have seen a few ghosts from children past. East of Highway 207, is the town of Richmond that was abandoned in the early 1900's (we were told everyone was gone by 1930.)
Abandoned homes, a church and a school sit on the picturesque landscape.The town wasn't what we had in mind (we were picturing main street in a wild west movie), but it was really fun to see this small abandoned town.